Category Archives: Australia

Leave a comment
Australia

A walk, a fall, a beer & a bet – Dandenongs, Australia

Sherbrook Falls, Dandenongs, Australia

Sherbrook Falls, Dandenongs, Australia

I appreciate a state that gives its residents a day off for a horse race. The 5.6 million inhabitants of the State of Victoria are given a public holiday for the Melbourne Cup each year. So, to take advantage of this free time I roped a friend in to taking us on a road trip.

Sometimes you only realise how much you miss open space and nature when you escape from a metropolis. Ferntree Gully is in the Dandenong Ranges it is only about an hour from Melbourne CBD but feels like another world. Even in the carpark the green & red parrots swooped overhead and happily pottered about in gangs on the tarmac. The sounds were unfamiliar, the air pungent and the temperature was even a few degrees cooler. Continue reading →

Tagged , , , ,
Leave a comment
Australia, Travel

What am I doing in Melbourne?

view from the rooftop cinema melbourne australia

View from the Rooftop Cinema Melbourne, Australia

This question was asked quite a bit recently, so I decided it would be a good idea to divulge some background information. From October 2010 to April 2011 my boyfriend and I travelled through Thailand, China, Laos and Malaysia. I am not a digital nomad and we got our money for travel the old-fashioned way, by saving.

I was working in contract positions as well as freelance writing. After paying the bills and day-to-day living costs, it took us about 2 years to save up slowly bit by bit. Working hard for our freedom, we sacrificed nights out and buying any new stuff in the process.

However, we had done this all before in 2007 and in 2004 I packed up and moved to Amsterdam for 3 ½ years. Stuffing backpacks, calling the utility companies and just hitting the road for as long as we possibly can is something we are used to. It’s nor everyone, but I find it keeps life interesting.

This is not me trying to show off here, I just want to say that if you really want to travel you can always find a way to do so. Don’t let a mortgage, fixed contract or money be an excuse to prevent you from realising your travel dreams.

So back on topic what the hell am I doing in Melbourne? In April, we flew from Kuala Lumpur to Melbourne basically to cash up. As Europe is in an economic catastrophe right now Australia is probably the best place to be. We are lucky that both our passports allow us to apply for a 1 year working holiday visa. I am working full time, writing part-time and my boyfriend is also working full-time and has several projects on the side. So we’re busy and back in saving mode. It kinda feels like being in limbo we are not quite travelling, not quite settled and we are far from home.

If we are able to reach our savings goal by next April we will have a lot of options. One of which is to live in Berlin for a year, en route visiting some of the pacific islands, Peru, New York, ….. ??

Any suggestions on my itinerary welcome!

 

Tagged , ,
Leave a comment
Australia

Melbournes artisan roasters pop up at Black Coffee

image

I sampled some of Melbourne’s finest roasted coffee at the Black Coffee pop up last weekend. Continue reading →

Tagged , , ,
Leave a comment
Australia

65 Degrees Café – Boutique coffee roasters with buzzing baristas

65-degrees-cafe-Melbourne

65 degrees café, Exhibition Street, Melbourne

Lunch in Melbourne CBD can be difficult to navigate for a visitor. The city makes you work to find its treasures. It is well known for hiding bars down maze-like laneways for example. Sometimes, I find it is like an expedition to wade through the high street past cookie cutter cafés to unearth a cosy corner for a tasty treat. However, there are plenty of them lurking under the skin of the city you just have to know where to look.

Melbournites in general are a relatively laid back bunch, however, when it comes to coffee they don’t mess around. Coffee even has its own language here; long black (americano), flat white (latte),  short mac (Macchiato).

Continue reading →

Tagged , , , ,
Leave a comment
Australia, Travel Updates

Life in melbourne and pics of our first months in Australia

Hi All,

Just a short one to let you know how things are going. We’re still living in Melbourne in the same funky neighbourhood. The person who’s place we are living in keeps extending her time away which is great for us. I have made good progress on the job front and should be able to start soon. We have been working on some of our web projects in the mean time and are learning lots and making good progress. I’m currently helping some of our mates in Amsterdam launch a drum and bass music label on-line (www.easternpromiseaudio.com)  and we have 3 other websites to work on, so no shortage of things to do.

Apart from from that, we are enjoying ourselves. We are getting further acquainted with our neighbourhood and other funky suburbs of Melbourne. I enjoy walking to the Library most days (about 40 mins) where I usually use the internet and resources in the afternoons. We often also walk back home from the city centre in the evenings and explore various suburbs at the weekends, sampling more of the great café’s and cheap eats that dot the streets.. The grittiness and abundance of quality graffiti around our area  ( Melbourne inner suburb called Fitzroy) also makes for some great shots. I recently picked up a great lens for our camera at a garage sale and am enjoying it to the fullest with all the cool things to photograph around our area.

[singlepic id=471 w=600 h= float=center]

ABOVE:Graffiti wall in Fitzroy, Melbourne. Graffiti of this size is actually quite common around the neighbourhood.

BELOW: One mouth watering sandwich at Babida last weekend. One of the many great bars and café’s in Fitzroy, Melbourne.

[singlepic id=472 w=600 h= float=center]

We also did a coach surf a few weeks back at the  start of the great ocean road which was a great experience. Very nice host, great food and cliff walks on the coast of south east Australia. So everything is moving on nicely, except for the fact that the winter has hit here  (damn you southern hemisphere!) . Things could be worse though, with temperatures at the level of your average Irish summers day…

I have added a good few photos that we took over the last view months roaming around. You can have a look through them below. Enjoy:

[nggtags gallery=Australia,…]
The pictures above are all images I have uploaded for Australia, If you click on one to enlarge it, you can browse through all of them in large format by clicking the left or right buttons. To see the image gallery for each location separately, Please check the Gallery pages from the menu at the top.

Tagged , , , ,